By Louise Jobe
According to the facebook page of the Gambia Armed Forces, The Gambia Navy patrol team Wednesday night, 20th November 2024, intercepted a suspected migrant boat in the River Gambia. The Navy’s High Speed Boat nicknamed “SEADOG” tracked and intercepted a local wooden boat suspected of carrying migrants while on its routine night security patrol in The Gambia territorial waters.
The boat was escorted to Banjul and was handed over to the Gambia Immigration Department (GID) for further investigation and processing.
The information gathered by the Navy personnel from the Migrants who were onboard the boat, revealed that the boat was carrying over 90 suspected irregular migrants including 32 Gambians, 32 Senegalese, 27 Conakry Guineans and 1 Malian. Also among them were 12 female and 11 minors.
The boat was said to have departed from Joal in Senegal via The Gambia to pick up these suspected migrants at sea near Faraba. The boat was intercepted in the high seas within the Gambia’s territorial waters.
The Gambia Navy said they will continue to collaborate with their partners to patrol Gambia’s territorial waters in order to adequately police our marine resources in line with its constitutional mandate.
